Frequently Asked Questions

Under Member Choice, AP is expanding its value for newspapers, both in print and online. Coverage is being increased in key target areas of growth, greatly enhancing the ability of newspapers to create custom news reports relevant to their local and niche audiences. Simultaneously, flexible new licensing will enable them to use AP content in wide range of local publications. Here are answers to some questions you may have about Member Choice. If you have additional questions please contact your AP Chief of Bureau.

What is Member Choice?
Member Choice is the pricing, content and expanded licensing program launched in January 2009 that simplifies and broadens member access to AP content. Mindful of the economic crisis, AP is offering further options for members to reduce their AP assessments for 2010.

Member Choice combines numerous “wires” that have been licensed separately, such as expanded sports text and agate, business, and lifestyles. It offers newspaper members access to more locally relevant content and more flexible licensing. The combination of content and licensing changes make it easier to innovate with specialized publications and Web content to drive readership and revenues.

Search and other tools in the new delivery system, AP Exchange, offer opportunities to build highly targeted local news feeds from the wire.

What changes to AP’s newspaper services were announced at the April annual meeting?
AP created two levels of Member Choice basic news service – the text report that every member gets – so that newspapers have more choices about the amount of national news coverage they want and added ability to lower costs.

AP also announced rate reductions on all text services, in light of economic conditions. The amount of reductions any particular paper sees will vary depending on what news services it chooses to take. We expect total newspaper assessments to decrease by almost 20 percent. The impact on rates will vary widely among members, depending on the choices they make.

Members also will gain options on length of term. They can continue the current notice period of two years, and receive a discount, or they can choose one-year terms of service.

The changes take effect Jan. 1, 2010.

What are the new Member Choice options?
Member Choice Complete, the full service all newspaper members now receive, will continue. It provides full access to all of AP’s English language reporting, including all state reports, full sports agate and coverage, financial markets reporting, and vertical news reports. Complete comes with tools for localizing or customizing the report for local interests or niche publications.

AP will launch Member Choice Limited, a very “light” text service of just the top national and international news for papers that have minimal coverage needs or are under financial constraints.

AP also created optional categories of text news so members can further adjust content and costs. Members taking Complete will be able to opt out of any of four categories: Sports, Lifestyles, Money & Markets or News Analysis. Papers dropping to Limited service can opt in or add back any of the four categories.

What about state news, PhotoStream and online services?
Complete subscribers get all state reports. Limited subscribers get their “home” state report, and will be able to add others for a fee.

PhotoStream and produced online services are among a menu of supplemental services that papers choose from to fit local market needs. No changes are planned in the supplemental services or their rates. They include AP Online, AP Hosted Custom News, AP Hosted Sports, Page-ready sports, the Online Video Network, subscription video products and State News Online. PhotoStream will continue to include free unlimited access to AP photo archives.

Can I use Member Choice content on my Web site?
You can. With Member Choice AP has broadened newspapers’ licenses to allow use of AP content in non-daily, local publications and Web sites. A selection of AP Member Choice content can be posted on member Web sites and to Web sites affiliated with member newspaper Web sites in the local market. Your AP chief of bureau can provide guidance on the Extended Local License as well as the Digital Use Agreement, which outlines how members can use AP content they receives for print newspaper(s) in approved digital services, such as Web sites and RSS feeds for its local markets. These provisions will make it easier for newspapers to innovate with specialized publications and Web content. The niche-content and expanded licensing offer opportunities for growth and innovation on the revenue side.

Does Member Choice Complete replace all my AP services?
AP Complete refers to the English-language text services drawn from what used to be separate “wires” to which members could subscribe, such as Limited DataStream, the Financial Wire, expanded sports coverage, the Race Wire, Snowbird Wire, Caribbean and LatAM wires and others.

Other AP services fall outside the Member Choice core text service. These services either offer specialized content, such as news in Spanish, or provide a package that combines content and technical solutions with AP news judgment, such as news produced for turn-key online use. These include Photostream, Page-Ready Sports, and online products such as Hosted Custom News, the Online Video Network or AP Hosted Sports. These remain optional services members can license to best meet their local market needs.

How does AP calculate rates?
As a cooperative, AP is required to have rates that are equitable across the membership, so that any newspaper of the same size, taking the same content, would pay the same rate for its basic text service. Rates are calculated based on print circulation, which is aggregated on a weekly basis to allow for differences in the number of days a week each newspaper publishes. Small newspapers pay less than larger members. Beyond the basic text service, each paper’s rates depend on what supplemental services it chooses to take. Full details on each paper’s rate calculations are available to that member from its local bureau chief.

How many newspapers have cancelled AP services?
The explanation is complex. To begin with, members first file a notice of cancellation, which provides a two-year window before actual services are stopped. So, what has happened recently is that papers have filed notices of cancellation. By way of background, over the past two decades, an average of about 4 percent of newspaper members have cancellation notices on file for AP basic services at any one time. Many papers file notices protectively, and then lift them before services are actually stopped. The number of cancellation notices now is running at about 14 percent. Any cancellation notice is cause for concern and we will be working with members to address the issues that led them to submit it.

Why does cancellation of AP service require a two-year notice?
From almost its inception, AP members, acting directly and through the AP board, have determined that members should provide AP with sufficient advance notice of cancellation of membership to ensure stable ongoing news gathering and distribution operations. This directly benefits AP and the members of the cooperative. That notice period has been two years.
However, AP has listened to those members who want greater flexibility in managing AP agreements and effective in January 2010, it will allow one-year notice provisions on basic service as well as supplemental services. Members who elect to continue under the long-standing two-year notice requirement will receive a discount on their assessment.

What percentage of member content goes into the AP report that's sold to commercial customers?
AP does not sell member-contributed content to Internet news providers. The amount of AP content sold to commercial portals, aggregators and others is consistently exaggerated. AP sells only AP-originated national and international content to commercial Internet customers. It is estimated that member copy makes up about 25 to 50 percent of AP's news reports on the state level, depending which state is measured. But those state reports are not available to commercial Internet customers.

How does AP feel about newspapers sharing content with each other?
AP understands the benefits of sharing content better than any other news organization – and in keeping with the spirit of the cooperative, AP empowers newspapers to set up their own member-to-member sharing of content via AP Exchange, a highly versatile and robust platform.

The AP Member Marketplace launched in spring 2008 and more than 600 members have signed up to participate. The service allows papers in a state to share text, photos and graphics with each other. The Marketplace is built into AP’s Exchange Web site which means editors can see AP content, syndicated content and now content contributed by members. Sharing regionally relevant news is an area of great interest for newspapers in many states and the AP Member Marketplace now allows for this sharing to take place.

The Marketplace service in Exchange also offers the ability to send email alerts, to quickly update, correct or kill content, to store content and publish it at a later date and to see statistics on how popular one paper’s content is with other papers in the state. There is no cost for the Marketplace with a paid membership in The Associated Press.